“Paper, in its countless forms, touches our lives every day and it’s a relationship that often goes unnoticed. We use it without a second thought – from our first cup of coffee and morning ablutions, to eating yoghurt, popping our vitamins or putting on lipstick.”

So says Jane Molony, executive director of the Paper Manufacturers Association of South Africa (PAMSA) in the association’s inaugural progress report. “Paper products are an enabler. Without them many industries would not be able to convey their messages, ship their products and deliver their goods. As the basis for tissue, paper is a bathroom essential and helps to improve lives through personal hygiene. As a medium through which learning is facilitated, paper educates and informs,” she adds.

Telling the fibre story

PAMSA’s industry report, Paper in Perspective 2016, tells a number of stories – the economic story, the sustainability story and the recycling story. It also delves into PAMSA’s efforts in the education, training and research space, and entrepreneurship training for recycling collectors.

Presented in an easy-to-read format, facts are abundant. Did you know that South African paper makers’ forests are home to 600 million carbon-absorbing, oxygen-giving trees? Or that only 9% of a plantation is harvested a year and that on average 260,000 new saplings are planted every day to replace what has been harvested?

Paper in Perspective 2016 clearly highlights how wood, pulp and paper – collectively fibre-based materials – are not only renewable but that their cellulosic foundations are taking the industry into new frontiers.

Cellulose used as a fibre additive in food and as a preservative in processed foods. It can be applied in the manufacture of cellphone and laptop screens, as well as through nanotechnology in automobiles, aerospace, defence and medical science.

Sustainability at the centre

The foreword – penned by PAMSA chairman and CEO of Mondi South Africa Ron Traill – sets out in no uncertain terms the value of the industry to the South African economy. In 2015 alone, paper, pulp and other associated products contributed R28 billion to the local fiscus and a significant R4.5 billion to the country’s balance of trade.

Crucially, more than 150,000 people are currently employed in the value chain from tree planting to paper making and recycling. Encouragingly, an estimated 38,000 work formally or informally in the recycling sector.

Valuable reference document – available on paper and online

Paper in Perspective 2016 is a one-stop guide to the South African pulp and paper making industry, its members and the vast scope of their activities. As a reference document, it will be of great value to industry commentators, journalists, economists, educators, students of all ages and people considering making a career in a vibrant and technologically advanced industry with an exciting future.

Naturally the publication has been printed on certified, sustainably produced paper, but is also available for download – and desktop printing.

The post Sustainability at the centre of paper manufacturers’ inaugural report first appeared on The Paper Story (PAMSA).

In the comprehensive study, scientists from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies (F&ES) and the University of Washington’s College of the Environment evaluated a range of scenarios, including leaving forests untouched, burning wood for energy, and using various solid wood products for construction.

The researchers calculated that the amount of wood harvested globally each year (3.4 billion cubic meters) is equivalent to only about 20 percent of annual wood growth (17 billion cubic metres), and much of that harvest is burned inefficiently for cooking. They found that increasing the wood harvest to the equivalent of 34% or more of annual wood growth would have profound and positive effects:

• Between 14% and 31% of global CO₂ emissions could be avoided by preventing emissions related to steel and concrete; by storing CO₂ in the cellulose and lignin of wood products; and other factors.
• About 12% to 19% of annual global fossil fuel consumption would be saved including savings achieved because scrap wood and unsellable materials could be burned for energy, replacing fossil fuel consumption.
• Wood-based construction consumes much less energy than concrete or steel construction. Through efficient harvesting and product use, more CO₂ is saved through the avoided emissions, materials, and wood energy than is lost from the harvested forest.

“This study shows still another reason to appreciate forests — and another reason to not let them be permanently cleared for agriculture,” said Chadwick Oliver, the Pinchot Professor of Forestry and Environmental Studies, director of the Global Institute of Sustainable Forestry at F&ES and lead author of the new study. “Forest harvest creates a temporary opening that is needed by forest species such as butterflies and some birds and deer before it regrows to large trees. But conversion to agriculture is a permanent loss of all forest biodiversity.”

The manufacture of steel, concrete, and brick accounts for about 16 percent of global fossil fuel consumption. When the transport and assembly of steel, concrete, and brick products is considered, its share of fossil fuel burning is closer to 20% to 30%, Oliver said.

Reductions in fossil fuel consumption and carbon emissions from construction will become increasingly critical as demand for new buildings, bridges and other infrastructure is expected to surge worldwide in the coming decades with economic development in Asia, Africa, and South America, according to a previous F&ES study. And innovative construction techniques are now making wood even more effective in bridges and mid-rise apartment buildings.

According to Oliver, carefully managed harvesting also reduces the likelihood of catastrophic wildfires. And maintaining a mix of forest habitats and densities in non-reserved forests — in addition to keeping some global forests in reserves — would help preserve biodiversity in ecosystems worldwide, Oliver said. About 12.5% of the world’s forests are currently located in reserves.

“Forests historically have had a diversity of habitats that different species need,” Oliver said. “This diversity can be maintained by harvesting some of the forest growth. And the harvested wood will save fossil fuel and CO₂ and provide jobs — giving local people more reason to keep the forests.”

• JOURNAL REFERENCE: Chadwick Dearing Oliver, Nedal T. Nassar, Bruce R. Lippke, James B. McCarter. Carbon, Fossil Fuel, and Biodiversity Mitigation With Wood and Forests. Journal of Sustainable Forestry, 2014; 33 (3): 248 DOI: 10.1080/10549811.2013.839386

Source: www.sciencedaily.com

The post Using More Wood for Construction Can Slash Global Reliance on Fossil Fuels first appeared on The Paper Story (PAMSA).

Nanocrystalline cellulose (NCC), which is produced by processing wood pulp, is being hailed as the latest wonder material. Japan-based Pioneer Electronics is applying it to the next generation of flexible electronic displays. IBM is using it to create components for computers. Even the US army is getting in on the act, using it to make lightweight body armour and ballistic glass.

To ramp up production, the US opened its first NCC factory in Madison, Wisconsin, on 26 July, marking the rise of what the US National Science Foundation predicts will become a $600 billion industry by 2020.

So why all the fuss? Well, not only is NCC transparent but it is made from a tightly packed array of needle-like crystals which have a strength-to-weight ratio that is eight times better than stainless steel. Even better, it’s incredibly cheap.

“It is the natural, renewable version of a carbon nanotube at a fraction of the price,” says Jeff Youngblood of Purdue University’s NanoForestry Institute in West Lafayette, Indiana.

The $1.7 million factory, which is owned by the US Forest Service, will produce two types of NCC: crystals and fibrils.

Production of NCC starts with “purified” wood, which has had compounds such as lignin and hemicellulose removed. It is then milled into a pulp and hydrolysed in acid to remove impurities before being separated and concentrated as crystals into a thick paste that can be applied to surfaces as a laminate or processed into strands, forming nanofibrils. These are hard, dense and tough, and can be forced into different shapes and sizes. When freeze-dried, the material is lightweight, absorbent and good at insulating.

“The beauty of this material is that it is so abundant we don’t have to make it,” says Youngblood. “We don’t even have to use entire trees; nanocellulose is only 200 nanometres long. If we wanted we could use twigs and branches or even sawdust. We are turning waste into gold.”

The US facility is the second pilot production plant for cellulose-based nanomaterials in the world. The much larger CelluForce facility opened in Montreal, Canada, in November 2011 and is now producing a tonne of NCC a day.

Theodore Wegner, assistant director of the US factory, says it will be producing NCC on a large scale. It will be sold at just several dollars a kilogram within a couple of years. He says it has taken this long to unlock the potential of NCC because the technology to explore its properties, such as electron scanning microscopes, only emerged in the last decade or so.

NCC will replace metal and plastic car parts and could make nonorganic plastics obsolete in the not-too-distant future, says Phil Jones, director of new ventures and disruptive technologies at the French mineral processing company IMERYS. “Anyone who makes a car or a plastic bag will want to get in on this,” he says.

In addition, the human body can deal with cellulose safely, says Jones, so NCC is less dangerous to process than inorganic composites. “The worst thing that could happen is a paper cut,” he says.

Source: New Scientist

The post Why wood pulp is world’s new wonder material first appeared on The Paper Story (PAMSA).